Live for Me
by PinkieKing
Summary: They battled through 80 miles of zombie territory to get to where they stood. The others may not have survived, but they'd be damned if they weren't going to live for those who hadn't. (Translation: It's 7am and you want me to write a summary? Go away.) Cry and the rest of the Late Night Crew, featuring Yunnie (her POV), with a little moment for Kirby too.


Seven days. That was how long we'd been fighting our way through the blood and chaos towards our chance at government evacuation. Supplies, when they'd been available, had been low, leaving us survivors malnourished, dehydrated, injured, and blood-soaked, but we were so close.

_So_ close to getting out of the hellhole that had once been Florida.

We'd all been staying in the southeastern state together when the infection hit. Some may say it was lucky timing, getting to face the zombie apocalypse with some of the people you loved and trusted the most rather than with strangers or completely alone, but I wasn't so sure.

_"You get closure if we, you know… bite the dust." _Scott had said one day when the topic came up. _"You don't have to spend all your time wondering if maybe, just maybe, we're alive and wondering the same about you."_

_"I really think I'd rather pretend you were alive than know you were dead," I replied. The room fell silent._

The same silence enveloped us now as we walked with a determined haste towards our destination. There were things, however, often accompanied silence; unwanted things that swirled in the back of my mind like a black hole, sucking me in when it deemed appropriate, such as right now. They were memories. My stride didn't break as the beginning of our experience replayed in my head. It was the memory that had replayed so many times, I wondered if my head was a skipping record.

_Our group had been holed up in the basement of a local grocery store, fiddling with the radio we'd almost given up on when we stumbled upon the radio transmission about an evacuation center. It was 80 miles south of us in a football stadium. Last evac would be on February 14th. I looked up at the calendar on the wall, frowning when I saw that it was already Feb. 7__th__. Had we really been holed up in that store for two months? _

_And were we really about to leave to cross 80 miles of hot, zombie-infested land with limited food and water? With a time limit of seven days?_

_"Hell yeah!" Cry suddenly cheered, inadvertently answering my unspoken questions. "Let's kick some zambie butt!"_

_"This isn't a game, Cry," Russ growled. The blonde's smiling lips pulled into a wounded frown, and he slid to a sitting position against the wall, looking with mild anger at Russ, who earned a hard glare from Red. _

_Red sat decidedly beside Cry and swung a comforting arm around his shoulders."Hey, pal. We just have to be careful, y'know? If we die now, we're really dead. Done deal, no second chance, no starting over." She gave his shoulder a squeeze and turned to face him a little more head-on. "So don't," she poked him in the center of his chest, "do anything stupid." _

Don't do anything stupid.

Everything that had happened had been stupid. It was stupid of the government to be testing their biochemical weapons on "secure" locations. It was stupid of them to let it escape. It was stupid of us to leave the grocery store.

It was stupid of us to think we'd all make it out of there alive.

"Yunnie."

I jumped at the sudden voice. Man, I'd really been zoning out.

"Hm?" I hummed in acknowledgement, glancing at the man next to me. Snake. I had somehow always known he'd be a survivor. He was tough. He was quick. He was sharp. Honestly, if there was one person out of our group who would be of real use in cleaning up this mess later on, it'd be him.

The sudden thought stopped me in my tracks. _If there was one person out of our group who would be of real use in cleaning up this mess later on, it'd be him_, so i_f it really came down to it and only one of us could make it to safety, it had to be him. _

He half-turned when he noticed I'd stopped walking. "Why'd you stop? We're almost there."

It was true. We were so close to the stadium that it really wasn't something I should have been concerned about, but the thought still loomed, and before I knew what was happening, I was voicing it.

"I'd take a bite for you, you know." My eyes found my feet and locked on them.

My gaze flickered up for a split second as he turned around to face me fully, but quickly shifted down again when I saw the expression on his normally unreadable face. His voice took on a dangerous edge. "What?"

Again, I spoke without meaning to. "You have so much to contribute to this messed up world, Snake. You're sharp and careful and distant and, well, it's not only that. You're the only one I have left. If I lose you, I'll have lost everyone. Everyone who matters to me will be dead, and I don't know if I can handle that. But you're tough. Not only could you handle that kind of emotion, you could take it and turn it into some sort of crazy Snake rage energy to take out even more zombies." I could sense myself getting a little off topic and quickly steered my speech back on course. "So if you were about to die because some sniveling corpse with a case of the munchies was going after you and there was something I could do about it, I'd do it. End of story."

There was a long pause. Almost long enough to make me look up, but just when I was about to give in I felt two powerful hands grasping my wrists and shaking them as emphasis as their owner snarled, "Don't talk like that, Yunnie. We have not come this far for you to call it quits, okay?" The choking tightness in his voice was enough for me to take my eyes off my blood-stained converse. There were tears in his eyes, clear as day. He swallowed hard and averted his eyes, uncomfortable with his own emotional display.

"What?" I stepped back, sliding my wrists from his grasp and wiping a tear from each eye. "I'm not calling it quits, Snake! I'm saying that if there's a zombie lunging at you and you aren't making a move to kill it, I'm jumping in front of your sorry ass." I grinned up at him, which he returned with a sad smile, acknowledging that I was both joking and being dead serious. "Now let's get a move on. This is literally going to be an uphill battle." I motioned towards the steep hill in front of us; the last obstacle to cross before we were at the stadium. I could just barely see the silver dome peeking over the top of the hill from where we stood.

"Right." He nodded sharply and stepped into formation, which was really just a straight line with just the two of us left.

As we picked off the few zombies that emerged from the bushes and small patches of tree on our way up the hill, the touchy-feely moment with Snake kept dragging itself to the front of my mind and plopping itself down there. Why, I wasn't quite sure. But I fought the growing feeling of dread it gave me by chanting one ting over and over within my head. _We will live._ I decapitated an undead woman with one swing of my machete. _We will live._ I dug the blade into the shoulder of what was once a man.

We would live for all of those who wouldn't.

We'd live for Cry.

_"I'm sorry Red. I went and did something stupid, didn't I?" Cry laughed weakly, clutching the bloody wound on the inside of his wrist. The rest of us formed a semi-circle around him, staring in shocked silence as the same thoughts plagued each of our minds. _

_We'd watched him get bitten. We watched him stoop down to grab the bullets he'd spilled. We watched it lunged at him and watched him kick it away. Why weren't we covering him? Why hadn't we thought to check the alley for lurking zombies? We could have saved him. We could have done something._

_"Just had to go all Lee Everett on you folks, didn't I?_ _Fucking box zambies…"_

_No one moved. _

_"Come on guys, that was a joke. Someone laugh."_

_Silence. _

_"Please. I don't think I can deal with this is someone doesn't laugh."_

_I burst out into a fit of high-pitched, insane giggles. It scared everyone, myself included, but Cry just smiled and giggled along with me. "See? Yunnie gets it."_

_Two hours later, after all of our goodbyes were said, Cry fell asleep leaning against a bookshelf in the house we'd cleaned out to stay the night in._

_We didn't let him wake up.. _

We'd live for Kirby.

_"We shouldn't have brought you along," I whispered into the dying boy's hair, letting my tears fall into the deep brown locks. "You'd have been safer at home." I shuddered at the memory. The worst part of what was happening was that it wasn't caused by zombies. _

_A miscalculated swing during a big fight had landed an axe straight into Kirby's side. The force of the blow had pushed him away, so the blade didn't get embedded in him, but even so, he was quickly bleeding out and the gash, wrapping around his side to the middle of his stomach, was far too deep to do anything. . _

_"Those axes can be a real bitch." The boy chuckled, which turned into a hoarse cough. Blood dripped from the corner of his mouth and onto his torn gray hoodie. "But there's nowhere I'd rather be." He grasped my free hand and squeezed it as tightly as he could, which wasn't very tightly at all. "I'll see ya soon enough, YunYun," he murmured, head lolling to the side as his eyes slipped shut. I continued to hold him in my lap as his breathing grew shallower and shallower, until it faded into silence. _

We'd live for Scott.

_"I can't take it! I can't take it!" The normally cool and collected Scott Jund held a pistol to his head, standing just outside the door to the deserted home we were staying in. "I killed him." His back to us, but I could hear the tears in his voice His gun-heavy hand was trembling dangerously. "I put an axe in him! He was only a kid! Fucking…" _

_Red took a step towards the man teetering on the brink of suicide. She was clearly the most emotionally sound at that point. The rest of us could only watch from the doorway in horrified silence, afraid that any sound, any word from our mouths, could set him off.. "Scott, it wasn't your fault. We were fighting hundreds of zombies. Everything was crazy, we were disorganized. You were just trying to stay alive." _

_"Like hell it wasn't my fault! I was aiming at him!" _

_Now even Red fell silent. _

_"I thought he was a zombie," Scott clarified after a few seconds. "There was so much blood. So much confusion. I swung, and I heard him cry out. I spilled his blood. I killed him. And now I can't live with it." Scott, who had fallen into a nearly crouched position during the ordeal, now jumped up, standing perfectly straight, and pulled the trigger before anyone could protest. I squeezed my eyes shut and heard Red scream, a sound even more horrifying than the gunshot. There was a dull thump and the clatter of the gun falling to the pavement. _

_Then everything was silent one more. _

We'd live for Raven.

_Running. We were always running from them. _

_The zombies liked to travel in groups, we'd discovered. They liked loud noises, too. So when they heard the little ice cream jingle from the truck we'd found—the only working vehicle we'd found in the 40 miles we'd traveled—they came running. _

_Raven, who was sporting a limp from a still-tender sprained ankle from a nasty tumble she'd taken during an earlier encounter, fell behind. I couldn't figure out why no one had just carried her, but it was too late to double back and grab her. The horde of undead was closing in on her, and fast. I started to slow down, yelling, "C'mon Zoots, you have to run!"_

_I saw pure panic in her eyes behind the goggles before she squeezed them shut and focusing all her energy on the sprint. Her entire face contorted in pain as her ankle took the full force of her weight with each stride, but she was sprinting. My heart began to pound in my chest. She was going to make it. She was going to catch up!_

_Then I noticed the open manhole directly in her path, and my heart sank to the pit of my stomach. The rest of us had all run around it, but Raven's eyes were closed. She didn't even see it. _

_"Raven look out!" I called, far too late to help. _

_One foot stretched in front of her, but didn't meet the ground. Time seemed to slow down as I watched her leg drop into the hole. I could see the way her eyes opened slightly in confusion and her mouth dropped open in surprise. I saw her arms go up to grab at something, anything, though they found only air. I watched her head connect with the pavement as she disappeared into the hole. _

_I wished I hadn't heard her hit the bottom. _

_And then I was being pulled forward again, still running._

_Always running._

We'd live for Russ, and for Red.

_"Ow! Fuck! That hurts like a bitch!" I heard Russ' voice above the moans of the infected outside. We'd finally run into a parking garage of an office building after the ordeal with the ice cream truck. I turned away from the heavy metal door to see Russ, a hand clasped across his shoulder, and blood leaking between his fingers. _

_"He's… he's bitten? Isn't he?" I asked. _

_"Ya think?" Russ lifted his hand to display the place where a chunk was missing from his shoulder. Red shoved his hand back into place and started murmuring soothing words to him._

_I brushed off Russ' angry remark and shuffled over to where Snake and BStar were conversing quietly to my right. "What do we do?" I asked, as though we had more than one option. "I mean who's gonna…?"_

_"I will," Red spoke up. How she'd heard our whispered conversation was beyond me; must've been some sixth sense of hers. _

_"Red you don't have to—" BStar started._

_"I'm not letting any of you put a bullet in Russ' head," Red snapped. "It's going to be me."_

_Russ looked up with slight alarm. "Hey hey, let's not get ahead of ourselves, guys. I'm not gone just yet."_

_"Might as well be," Snake muttered under his breath. Then, seeing the harshness of his words he added, "Sorry."_

_The door to the parking garage banged loudly, heavy dents forming in the thin metal shutter. It was going to cave soon enough._

_Goodbyes were once again exchanged, a little more rushed than the other times. It never got easier for me to say it, as the tears on my cheeks revealed, but it was necessary. _

_"Okay, you guys get out of here," Red said when the rest of us were done. _

_"But Red they're gonna—"_

_"Door. GO," she growled. The metal of the parking garage door creaked loudly, moans from outside leaking in as the metal pulled away from the frame. Snake and BStar each seized one of my arms and guided me to the door, which was, beyond all odds, unlocked. _

_I glanced over my shoulder one more time as the metal shutter came crashing away and zombies poured into the garage. Red was sitting beside Russ, one hand clutching Russ' and a lit cigarette in the other. She turned and met my gaze, winking as she tipped her head up blew out a steady stream of smoke. Then the zombies were upon them and I was being jerked roughly inside the building by my two remain companions. _

_I glanced back at the door, thankful that the scene behind it was blocked out, and winked just once towards the slab of steel before I was pulled to a hallway to the right, and the door disappeared from my sight._

And finally, we were going to live for BStar.

_"Yunnie, think about this. He can't hold food down, he can't carry anything, he can't protect himself, he can't even walk. We've been staying in here for a full day. I'm sorry. We can't afford to lose any more time. We've got to go." _

_I looked again at the boy I loved, sleeping with such a fretful expression on his face. He had a horrible fever from an infected gash on his leg he'd gotten while leaving the office building. He had kept walking for as long as he could, but the combination of his leg injury, fever, and dehydration eventually collapsed onto the pavement. Snake scooped him up without missing a beat and started moving to the nearest house, where he had placed BStar on a bed. He'd been asleep almost the entire 24 hours, waking up only a few times to try and eat unsuccessfully. _

_"BStar," I whispered to the sleeping figure in front of me. "BStar we have to go. You have to wake up, come on." I reached out and touched his arm. It was burning hot, and I cringed slightly. "BStar wake up." _

_He rolled away from me. "Five more minutes," he mumbled into the pillow. _

_"BStar we're leaving. Now. Come on, we're taking you with us."_

_He slowly turned to look over his shoulder at me. "You can't."_

_"What do you mean I can't? BStar you're coming with us come on. _

_"Yunnie." He sighed and tried to sit up, but found he couldn't, so I reached out and helped him. "Look at me. I can't even sit up, let alone walk. I'm just going to slow you down. I'm probably going to d—"_

_"If you say you're going to die, I will mince you," I threatened. Tears began to spill from my eyes when I realized what he was telling me to do._

_"You and Snake are getting out of this alive. If I stay with you, we're going to miss that last evacuation and we're all going to die. Simple as that. Yunnie, you have to go and you have to make it out of here. For Cry, for Kirbs, for Scott and Zoots and Russ and Red you _are _getting out of here." He stared at me intensely for a moment before falling, almost literally, into my arms and giving me a long kiss. When he pulled away, his eyes were watering as well. "Goodbye Yunnie. Say bye to Snake for me too, okay?" I nodded with a tight smile and stood to go. _

_"But um, before you leave…" I turned around and raised an eyebrow. "Could you, ah… hand me my gun?" He frowned, preparing for my protest, but I just sniffed and nodded, sliding the Magnum I'd been keeping on my hip into his hand. _

_"I love you," he whispered. _

_"I love you too." I chocked back, moving a hand up to my mouth to hold back a sob. I turned on my heel and walked as quickly as I could out the door and down the hall, burning the final image of my BStar in my mind._

_Snake didn't question me as I marched out the front door and down the street. He followed without so much as a glance in my direction._

_I barely flinched when I heard the gunshot echo down the street a few seconds later. I kept my pace, the only change in my movement being when I turned my head towards Snake and said, unceremoniously, "BattleStar says bye." _

The crest of the hill was so close I could make out the stars on the flag atop the stadium's dull silver dome. I broke formation—like it really mattered—and sprinted to the top of the hill. The stadium rose before me like a sort of Holy Grail, nearly glowing with the promises it held for Snake and me. From the corner of my eye I saw the other survivor catch up to me and stop, mesmerized by the sight.

"It's beautiful," I whispered.

"Indeed."

I turned then, and did something I didn't think anyone had ever attempted before, likely valuing their own life too much to risk losing it. I pulled him into a hug.

I don't know what I expected when I wrapped my arms around Snake. One thing I can guarantee wasn't on the list was for him to lay his arms across my back in a returned hug.

By the time I released him from the hug and saw the snarling corpse lunging for Snake's back, I was certain it was too late, but some animalistic instinct in me sent me shooting forward, tackling the monster to the ground and rolling a few feet down the hill with it until I found leverage and pinned it. I held its wrists firmly against the ground and straddled its abdomen, rendering it incapable of doing much more than snap its teeth and kick at the air. The one thing it kept _me _from doing, however, was reaching for the pistol at my hip without freeing one of the creature's arms.

"Snake! Shoot it!" I called, not too loudly so no other infected individuals would come running.

A single gun shot, muffled somewhat by the silencer Snake had equipped it with forever ago, rang out and a hole appeared in the undead woman's head. When she didn't continue moving, I started to stand, only to be offered a hand from Snake. I took it gratefully and stood. "You saved me back there," he said with slight amusement. I grinned.

"Told you I'd jump in front of your sorry…"

No way.

Snake followed my eyes down to the hand he was grasping and slowly turned it over.

There, plain as day along the pinky side of my hand was a series of bleeding lines shaped like a little crescent.

"Fuck," Snake breathed. I looked up at him, trying to find comfort in his always calm, nearly stoic face, but it was contorted in a reflection of the panic that was rising in me. We both stood there for a moment, just staring at the blood dripping from my hand, before Snake started pulling me back up the hill.

"What are you—"

"We're getting out of here."

"Snake, I'm dead! Even if I get to the stadium with you, there's no way they'll let me go with you."

"If it means you live longer—"

"Snake stop." I stopped where I was, right at the top of the hill again, but this time under much darker circumstances. He tried to keep walking, but I didn't budge. It would have looked comical to anyone else watching, had there been anyone alive to see the bulky 6 foot tall man unsuccessfully trying to move the little Korean girl who barely reached his chin in height and was nowhere near his build.

"Yunnie—"

"No. I'm dead, okay? I know I'm breathing right now, but this just became my death sentence, tight here." I flexed my scarlet-tinted hand. "I'm sorry that I couldn't make it, okay? But I told you that I would take a bite for you and I damn well meant it. I'm not going to follow you to the stadium where you would watch me get shot in the face by some kid in camo. I'd much rather die at the hands I trusted. I…" I hesitated, knowing the pressured I'd be putting on him if I asked for this. "I want you to do it. Please."

"Yunnie I couldn't—"

"Please."

Something about the look I was wearing must have made something in him give way, because he slowly started to nod. "Okay. If that's what you want."

He slipped his gun into his free hand and slid the other from around my wrist to take my hand instead. "You were always like a little sister to me, you know."

I smiled. "Yeah, and you were my big, tough older brother, Snake. You really were. You were there for me when others put me down, stepping in to my defense. You listened. You cared. We really were like family."

"We really _are,_" he corrected sternly.

The gun made its way to my temple, and my free hand to his elbow to hold his trembling arm steady. He rested his chin on the top of my head and we just stayed there for a moment, neither of us willing to kill me just yet. But the moments soon dragging into full minutes, and I could feel the infection taking its toll. My muscles were beginning to ache, and my head was throbbing.

But what finally pushed me to hurry it up was the sound of helicopter blades slicing air in the distance.

"Snake. You have to go."

I felt him nod before pressing his cracked lips against my forehead.

"Take it easy, kid," he murmured into my hair. He squeezed my injured hand tightly as his finger curled around the trigger.

The last thing to cross my mind were words BStar had told me what seemed like so long ago, though in reality it had been only a day.

"_Yunnie, you have to go and you have to make it out of here. For Cry, for Kirbs, for Scott and Zoots and Russ and Red you _are _getting out of here," _he had told me.

_I'm sorry I let you down, _I thought. A single tear slipped down my check.

Then there was a deafening explosion, followed by a silence more beautiful than any other I'd ever known.

For this time, the memories didn't come.


End file.
